Puritanical Petunia
by Rezallia
Summary: Petunia ruminates on her nephew's place in the Dursley household and what caused her to treat him so dismally.  She determined to reverse the roles. Ordinary reigning over extraordinary, and in doing so, she'd set the mold for the two disparate boys....


Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter.

Authors Note: I wrote this solely for the purpose of peeking into Petunia's Puritanical psyche. Say that five times fast.

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Petunia leaned over her sink to look out her kitchen window, one of her long, bony hands gripping the edge of the counter. The sun shone through the glass, making the spotless sink glint in the garish brightness. It was a very nice day outside, albeit a little hot. She shielded her eyes from the sun with the skeletal hand that wasn't clutching the tile counter, looking as far as she could outside her observation station. There wasn't anything of real interest going on.

Mrs. Evans down the street had recently acquired a fondness for ceramic gnomes, and Petunia had mutinously rifled through their community's restrictions but could not find any strictures against fantastical creatures being displayed on lawns. But Petunia had complained about that enough to Vernon, and she had, frankly, lost her vehemence for that particular subject even though it was completely inconsiderate of that woman to blemish her perfectly ordinary, unassuming neighborhood with such unsightly adornments.

A boy, about seventeen with black hair and a few stray scratches marring his face, walked past the house, kicking a pebble in front of him. He had oversized clothing on, making him look like one of those London ruffians. She noticed his expressionless mouth and eyes, as well as the out-of-date, cheap glasses that fell down his longish nose.

She tried not to notice him. A group of boys around a similar age had converged in the neighbor across the street's yard. They stood near the big sunflower which, in Petunia's opinion, had done nothing for Mrs. Ellis' garden; if anything, it had made her yard look like some sort of side-show.

But not even that horrid vegetation, nor the boys who stood around it in such a menacing fashion, could stop her thoughts from returning to the boy who walked down the street so languorously. In fact, the boys across the street made thoughts of the freak storm at the doors of her brain, breaking and entering into the serene, sterile thoughts that she had varnished so nicely in denial.

When she looked at the boy-- the freak boy whom her sister had left at her doorstep-- she saw a boy; nothing more, nothing less. But you couldn't _see_ his sort of freakiness. It was buried deep inside him. It was always there, biding its time, lying dormant until it would spring up and cause some freakish disaster.

But just looking at him—no, you couldn't see the pain he had caused her family. He had infiltrated her nest of perfection with his pathetic sob story. Their lives had been normal—mundane and monotonous—but that was how she liked it. They would get up; she would cook breakfast; they would eat breakfast together—Vernon would read the paper and Dudley would adorably eat his cereal with enthusiasm (and a strong throwing arm)--; then her husband would go to work, and she would spend the day with Dudley, taking strolls around the neighborhood and going to parks; and Vernon would come back home to his loving family. It was a set routine full of wonderful mediocrity.

However, when the boy had come, all that had changed. The green in his eyes was a painful reminder of her sister's vivacity and _stupidity_. _She_ had left to join a world full of abnormality—a world where a person could get hurt outside their bubble of safety. That was what Petunia had built around herself—a bubble of safety where no one in her family could get hurt because there was no possible way to get hurt. She didn't put herself out there; instead, she encouraged living vicariously through video games and television. Most of all, she let her son indulge in all of the safe things in life—like eating. Eating was harmless, she thought ignorantly, for it had never directly killed anyone like magic had done.

When the boy came, a connection had been forged between them and that freakish world where nobody could hide from danger. She remembered when she'd first heard about Voldemort through the slightly ajar doorway into Lily's room where she and JAMES had conversed. It had been a long palaver about all the heinous things this psycho had done, and Petunia had been horrified to hear that no one was safe. She had actually felt worried for her sister; even though she disliked her for all her good attributes, Petunia hadn't hated her. In fact, she'd loved her. Jealousy had driven the rift between them.

Lily had been the special one while Petunia had been the average, even dull, one.

Petunia had been determined, when Potter had arrived on her doorstep, to rectify her parents' mistakes. In reality, Dudley wasn't all that interesting—despite his wide girth and his guardians' exuberance. However, Petunia didn't see that because she had determined in her mind that Dudley was the extraordinary child of her dreams while Harry—her magical burden—was the good-for-nothing orphan who should be met with nothing but disdain.

By the time she had looked into the child's vibrant green eyes, the damage had been done. They were HER eyes—the eyes that had looked at Pet and her tidy, neat life with something akin to pity because, of course, she hadn't done anything _fabulous_. Well, Petunia would look back sardonically, look whose lifestyle had worked out and whose hadn't! Her sister had been blown up by a psychotic Dark Lord while she, Petunia, had been the triumphant victor.

It had almost been like divine retribution—getting the chance to raise Lily's son to be the worthless one in the family. Certainly her parents had never voiced their opinions of her status, but she had felt their disappointment in her. She'd grown up to be a mere housewife as Lily had gone on to be a witch of great importance. Petunia's friends in secondary school had looked at her in admiration for catching Vernon Dursley and being absolutely, perfectly normal in every way, but her family had different ideas about accomplishment—all thanks to Lily. Even if she had wanted to become something like Lily, she couldn't because she didn't have the genetics that Lily had; she didn't have magic.

So she put the boy in the cupboard because he hadn't deserved a room. Dudley, however, deserved two rooms for what he lacked in genetic make-up. She let Dudley eat whatever he wanted while Harry ate table scraps like a disenchanting canine. And when Harry would come home with dark purple bruises all over and Dudley would lord over the small, skinny boy, pounding his knuckles into his palm, Petunia would smile secretly to herself, glad that finally the ordinary one was dominating over the extraordinary.

For a while she had thought her life as the boy's guardian wouldn't be that bad. Nothing out of the ordinary had really happened outside the house. Sometimes something _off_ would occur during breakfast or in the parlor, but she would overlook it—in a way, she felt generous—but she would send the child to his cupboard without meals—apparently for no reason. That probably had made the child's stay at the house worse—because he couldn't fathom a pattern for her punishments. It was imperative that she quash the magic in him by any means necessary. But as the magical boy continued to grow, these accidents grew worse, and because the laws mandated school attendance, his magical acts burgeoned more conspicuously.

When he had turned his teachers' hair blue, for instance, she had sent him to his cupboard without meals for three days; after those three days she generously gave him bowls of broth, bread, and water.

And once, when he had been about seven, she supposed, a neighborhood woman had vociferously spoken about another strange occurrence involving her own son, intimating to her rapt audience that Harry Potter, Petunia Dursley's nephew, had been the perpetrator of a strange prank and that nobody could understand how he had done it. The woman had commented on how strange the boy was, and she had even commented on _how- he- must- have- been- raised_ to be such a nuisance. That night Petunia had gotten so angry that she had hit the boy around the face a few times. It had been the first time she had done so. Thereafter, she only did it on occasions that merited such a response—at least in her eyes.

When those horrid missives _from that school_ had come, she had gotten hysterical, and her husband could see it in her eyes. He had done all he could to isolate them from those dreadful epistles, but she knew from that old coot's letter that they wouldn't give up on the boy who had stopped the murderer Voldemort. She lost hope when the giant of a man Hagrid had arrived at the shack on that tiny island. The boy would grow up like his mother—like a sore thumb, screaming to be killed by another mass-murderer if he really had gotten rid of the first one. He would reach the same end as she had, thinking, however, that he had lived a much better life than Dudley because of his magic and the friends he had.

Friends who would die for him as Lily's husband had died for her.

It had all been in the letter Dumbledore had placed in Harry's bassinet. James, the silly boy who had thought her ignorant and told her stupid stories about werewolves and vampires _(witches and wizards existed, but surely not vampires and werewolves!),_ had died nobly for his wife and child. A greater love than that does not exist, but she hated that boy for all his freakiness.

However, she often found herself wondering whether Vernon would die for her and her child. He prided himself on his family—his bravado was unending, but would he really sacrifice everything for them? Sadly, she didn't really know, but that was just one more reason to scorn her sister and Harry Potter.

It was obvious that she had predicted rightly about her nephew. Dumbledore, for the past two years, had written her letters, warning her about Harry's mental health, and she'd been too curious to merely toss them. And these warnings had been warranted. During all hours of the night, he would make a terrible racket, calling out names to high heaven. His appearance also spoke of struggle; he came home with scratches and lacerations that seemed to never heal.

Soon he would leave them, and she doubted that he would come back.

She had realized, eventually, after he had started at the freak school, that her response to him hadn't been so smart. He _was _a wizard, and he always would be. He could use his magic against them; rather than lauding Dudley for his Harry Hunting, she should have been keeping him away. He could snap at any moment and kill them all.

That was when she'd realized that her parents, too, had been slightly wary of their daughter Lily. Petunia had been the _safe _one. Lily had been dangerous.

They were helpless against magical people.

However, propitiously, Petunia didn't think Harry had the stuff to harm them. He hadn't been embittered, apparently; in fact, according to his Headmaster's letters, Potter was _noble_. He had, apparently, risked his life to save some of his weird friends. Just like his mother. Too abnormal to even hold a grudge.

She watched him, through narrow eyes, mosey down the street detachedly. The boys across the street stared at him as he walked past them; some even jeered. He didn't bat an eyelash—so strange. So odd. So abnormal.

"Potter, are you really queer like your cousin says?!" one of the boys called out to Harry's back. The rest of the pack laughed though some looked afraid because, after all, they were taunting the scourge of Privet Drive, the delinquent Harry Potter.

"Cedric!" another one chimed in, donning a high-pitched voice. They laughed uproariously.

This time the lanky boy stiffened. Petunia could see his back tense, and his eyes gave off an incensed and palpable darkness.

_Don't you go for that stick of yours, so help me if you do…._

For a moment, the giraffe-like woman held her breath, watching her nephew's hand twitch toward his pocket, but he didn't pull it out. He merely clenched his shaking fingers, breathing deeply.

"Look at him, he really is queer like Big D says."

She wasn't as oblivious to Dudley's antics as Harry or Dudley believed. It wasn't a matter of observance; instead, it was a matter of avoidance.

She would rather live in denial than realize that _Harry_ was the good son. And it was _all_ her fault. Denial was blissful.

She heard Vernon walk through the door, and he didn't sound very happy. Turning from Potter, she moved towards the stove to stir the contents of the pot.

"Petunia? Where's that boy!?" he roared.

She didn't answer until her husband had entered the kitchen.

"He's outside. What's the matter?" her voice rang sharply throughout the rather resonant room; the tiles seemed to vibrate with the mere frequency of her voice.

Vernon visibly stooped and lowered his voice, "I bumped into one of _his kind_ today. One of the freaks from the train station last year."

"_One of them!_ Did he say anything to you?" she asked breathlessly.

"'Said we'd better keep a sharp eye on the boy. Apparently, the old geezer who ran the school's dead. Murdered."

Petunia's eyes almost rolled back into her head, and she had to steady herself on the countertop.

"Dead? How—when—did he say?" Why had they taken the boy in? See how deep they were into this horrid society?

"Recently. The boy's in trouble. I have half a mind to turn him out on his ear. But I suppose you won't have that?" Vernon sounded hopeful that she had changed her mind.

Three words rang in her head as if they had been magically set there and amplified.

REMEMBER MY LAST

"He has to stay, Vernon," she answered coolly. Vernon looked at her abashedly.

It had been the same thing, over and over, since they'd taken the boy in. Vernon would attempt to coerce her into giving the boy up—at first it was the orphanage, but then it evolved into sending him to that freak school full-time. At times, she'd almost acceded and sent him to that Orphanage in London. They even had the papers that would rid them of guardianship, but she could never bring herself to sign them.

She faintly heard shouting.

"SHUT UP ABOUT THAT! YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT!"

She glanced out the window, with a deep frown making her wrinkles more pronounced. Potter had drawn himself up to his full height, and straight-backed, he looked down at all the other boys, for he had finally had a growth-spurt. She couldn't see his face, but she could see that of the others.

They looked ashen and terrified, and she knew he was giving him his look. _The look_. A look that terrified her more than any magic in the world: a dark gaze that spoke of terrible suffering and a dormant anger that could be unleashed at a moment's notice. A look that had only emerged since he'd begun at his odd school.

When he'd realized he deserved better than a cupboard under the stairs and the discarded possessions of others, perhaps.

She saw the other boys cower in fear of the delinquent boy they'd heard stories about, but apparently, their effrontery had grown through Potter's otherwise passive nature. They'd never seen any evidence of the boy's mental imbalance.

The boy's voice had lowered dangerously, so Petunia couldn't hear the rest of the altercation despite her extremely sharp ears, but she knew it couldn't be something good.

Abruptly, he turned around and walked toward the house, and Petunia saw traces of a smirk creep onto his features. She shuddered compulsively.

Bad blood doesn't dissipate.

And, apparently, magic can't be quashed out.

He'll be gone in a few weeks. Forever. She just needed to keep telling herself that.

Good riddance.

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Review please! I hope I got you feeling a bit mutinous—and maybe even a bit understanding….


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